start a war
by a ghost in schoolclothes
Summary: In one startling moment, Thor sees his little brother again.


**Here's another little one-shot. :D It's slightly different from the last one; this is set in Thor's POV, so I tried to alter the "voice," so to speak, to fit his instead of Loki's. Thanks so much for reading; I'd appreciate if you left a review! I don't own Marvel or any of its characters, and I don't own the song that inspired this, either. **

_"You were always weird, but I never had to hold you _

_By the edges like I do now._

_Walk away now, and you're gonna start a war." _

_-"Start a War," The National_

There's a moment, when Thor first breaks into that obnoxious metal mortal contraption and snatches a green-clad demigod from within it, where he stops right before diving out and grabs said demigod's face to inspect it.

For so long, he has believed that Loki is dead, having plummeted into the dregs of the Nine Realms, and he has mourned. He has sat many a time in the chambers of his little brother, wondering what secrets had laid in the room to drive him to what he had attempted. He wonders if he was really so naïve to have not caught on sooner.

Now he narrows his eyes at the chin clutched roughly in between his fingers, where he sees a small white scar from one of their earliest sword duels; at the pale, sharp angles on the countenance (has his brother been eating?); at the green, green eyes, glinting in the dark with so much fervor despite the purple bags under them.

This is his brother. This is Loki. And he is very much _alive. _

There is something like anger, something like sadness, something like disappointment swelling in his chest, but over everything he feels _relief. _

()()()

He remembers when they were children.

They often dueled in the training grounds (every Friday, to be exact), in front of the other Aesir children. The boys loved to challenge each other to brawls in the courtyards, competing for the girls' attention. Needless to say, Thor was a real catch with the girls. He was a natural with a sword, jabs and parries instinct to him, but Loki was another matter entirely.

Loki was small, smaller than Thor and the other children, and his infirmity often made him the object of ridicule among the Asgardian youngsters. It wasn't rare for him to find Thor's sword (dulled, of course, for the safety of children) pointed at his chest, but he was tenacious nonetheless, grumbling to himself before standing and declaring, "Let's go again!"

But one blithe day, they dueled in the hallways of the castle. They played in the corridor, footfalls resounding on the marble floors, giggling as boys do when their swords met. Though Thor's strikes could be considered reckless, he had enough skill to overpower his brother's less-than-great force. Loki took part in the same awkward dance here that he did at the training grounds, his feet smooth then stuttering on the castle floor as he attempted to keep his guard up. Only here, in the seclusion of his own home, his face was bright and smiling instead of twisted in effort. He looked to be enjoying himself; happy, even.

Thor, laughing, set his sword in motion: A horizontal arc at his brother's head. But Loki ducked, dropping low in an unusual moment of skill, and Thor's sword continued its swing, knocking a vase off the table just behind Loki. The precious urn shattered upon contact with the floor, echoing ominously in the hall.

Loki straightened as he lowered his sword, turning from the broken vase to Thor, who was standing open-mouthed with guilt written plainly on his ashen face. "Oh, no," he whispered, letting his own weapon clatter to the floor. "Father is going to be so angry—"

"Why would I be angry?"

The third voice startled both children, and they swiveled around to see Odin making their way down the hall. Thor visibly paled in apprehension as Odin's eyes landed on the smashed valuable in pieces on the floor. "Which one of you broke this?" Odin asked with a sigh, a soft accusation as his one eye narrowed reproachfully.

Thor's mouth moved helplessly as he attempted to form words. Out of his peripherals, he noticed Loki's eyes drift over to his own pallid, guilty face, then back to Odin's stony countenance with a raw resolution. "It was me," the dark-haired boy said suddenly, his tiny fist squeezing the leather-bound handle of his sword. The words fell so naturally from his lips that Thor nearly believed them himself. His brother spoke with such appeal, such certainty, even though the admission to guilt was plainly false.

Odin's eye shifted to Loki, looking less than surprised and more than a little disappointed, and the All-Father sighed again before speaking. "The two of you know you are not to play with your swords inside," he said quietly. "Loki, this is the consequence. Clean this up at once. Thor, go to your room until your brother is finished."

Thor blinked, his eyes still wide and his jaw still slack. He turned abruptly to Loki, who glanced over at the same time and offered him the subtlest of smiles, his eyes quietly saying, _Go. _

Scooping up his own sword from the ground, Thor spun around and scuttled off down the hallway.

That was the first time Loki lied for him.

()()()

As a child, Thor had made a habit of barging into his brother's room, and once he barreled through the doors to find Loki sitting cross-legged on the bed, one hand placed in front of him as if holding some invisible ball in his palm. His brow was furrowed in concentration, and for a moment Thor was confused before he noticed the candles.

There were several of them, small, cylindrical, and green, and they were _floating. _They were suspended in midair, hovering around Loki's perch on his bed with their tiny flames flickering. Open-mouthed, Thor closed the doors behind him. "What is this?" he asked, awed.

Loki didn't move, his tongue flitting out to moisten his lips. He gave no physical sign as to whether he noted Thor's company, but he replied verbally: "Me. Practicing my magic." He paused, his eyes shifting to Thor for a mere second before moving back to his floating candles. "You're welcome to watch. I'm pretty good." He grinned.

Thor, entranced, sidled past one candle, ducking under it and taking a seat on one of the plush armchairs in the corner. "Where did you get all these candles?"

"Mother's bathroom."

Thor blinked. "You stole them?"

Loki rolled his eyes as if the idea was preposterous. "No. They quite literally grew legs of their own, thanks to me, and walked into my room, scaring quite a few servants in the process. I'm only _borrowing_ them, though."

Thor chuckled. "You can't return burned candles, brother."

"Oh." Loki paused to ponder this, fingers twitching. "Well, I suppose I _did_ steal them, then." But he did not seem ashamed of this; he appeared rather pleased, an even wider grin splitting across his face. "I can keep them in my room, then, and no one will ever know. No one ever comes in here but you." He waved his hand, and the candles' flames simultaneously went out as the candles themselves fell to the floor.

Reacting quickly, Thor caught one as it dropped, smiling widely as he stood from his seat. Loki slid off the bed and stood as well, flicking his wrist and sending the candles on the floor to various positions around his room with each directing movement: upon the crowded bookshelf, on the bedside table, on the windowsill.

As he approached Thor, he pointed at the candle. "Smell it."

Thor obediently brought his nose to the candle and inhaled; it smelled sweet, like jasmine and the dew in the morning. "Good," he said, looking back up to his brother.

"Yes, it is," Loki agreed. He passed his hand over the candle and it lit itself again, the small flicker of fire dancing on the stem. "You can keep that one, if you like."

"Thank you, brother." Thor's smile stretched. "I bet Father would be greatly amused by this display of sorcery. I know I am."

There was a flash of something in Loki's eyes, a quick look at some unbridled albeit tentative pride, like a glass of drink tipping over and threatening to spill, but then Loki's smile simply grew to match Thor's. "Perhaps."

()()()

Ask any Aesir who befriended Thor and Loki (but mostly Thor) in their teenage years, and they will undoubtedly tell about an event that has come to be known as "_The _Duel," emphasis on "the" when spoken of so the listener knows exactly what is being talked about.

At sixteen, Thor had already filled out with muscle, turning from boy to man in perhaps a week, while Loki, still scrawny and two years his junior, was caught somewhere in between. The two still dueled every Friday, but the crowd of spectators now consisted of elder Aesir councilmen and warriors mixed with childhood friends, the former of which eager to glimpse the crowned princes in action so they could prepare them for real battles.

Thor had vastly improved due to years of vigorous training, and although Loki was mediocre at best, he was a cleverer fighter than most. Thor had watched his brother's own skill grow nearly passable, but he had also noticed some oddities, such as the fact that Loki's opponents usually ended up tripping over some invisible block, or that their swords would somehow slip from their fingers and propel themselves across the battle ground as if clumsily kicked. Most who were aware of Loki's studies of magic would gripe and complain about the tricks, but they could never prove that it was such, and Loki would pass off each grievance with a shake of his head and a knowing smirk that was a perfect companion to the mischievous gleam in his eyes.

So Thor climbed into the battle ground warily, eyeing his brother with mock suspicion. At his expression, Loki stopped spinning his sword's hilt in his hand and laughed. "Have you come to lose?" he teased.

"Hardly," Thor called back, grinning. "Have you?"

"_Hardly_," Loki returned, imitating Thor's tone impeccably as he lifted his sword. "Ready? Don't go easy on me, now."

Thor snickered—what a foolish thing to say—and lunged forward, sword poised to strike. He brought the blade down hard with the movement, but Loki simply vanished, reappearing just behind Thor and sweeping a foot at Thor's legs. For a moment Thor was shocked—_how did he move so quickly?—_before he fell into a roll and regained his feet, avoiding the kick.

"Missed me," Loki taunted from the other side of the battle ground.

"Clever evasion, brother, but you cannot do that in an actual fight; only cowards dodge." Thor's tone was light and the onlookers chortled at the jest, but Loki's eyebrows drew together, his lips thinning into a grim slash. He shot forward, surprisingly fast, his steps fluid on the paved ground beneath him, and thrust his sword forward at Thor's chest.

Thor parried easily, pushing back; Loki was thin, _frail, _even, and in battles of strength Thor was sure to come out on top. The blades sizzled as Loki gritted his teeth and attempted to shove back, only to have Thor disparage this idea with another drive against him. Unfortunately, Thor's forward momentum did not help when Loki fell back and flattened himself against the ground, allowing Thor's body to roll over his and plow into the cobblestone.

Grimacing, Thor stood again, eyes searching for his sword. He spotted it mere feet away and stooped for it, only to have it skitter out of his reach. His eyes tracked it to Loki, whose hand had moved imperceptibly as he sniggered. He kicked the sword into the corner of the battle ground; Thor would now have to get past his armed brother if he wished to reclaim his weapon. "Oops," Loki said. "So inept of you, brother, to accidentally lose your weapon to me."

Thor shook out his arms and cracked his knuckles. "If you want to play it like this, so be it," he retorted, smiles gone. His brother was not fighting a fair fight, and besides, it was against the training rules to use magic in a spar. Then again, when had either of them ever been labeled _fair_?

Now he moved forward again, arms up to block, hands balled into fists. The observers gasped as Loki took to swinging his sword wildly in front of him to keep Thor at bay, but each strike was effortlessly avoided with diagonal sidesteps and perfectly-timed shifts. Slowly Thor drove Loki towards the corner where his sword was, forcing his brother back. _If I can just reach my weapon . . . I can win this easily. _

When Loki's sword had reached the end of one arc and was about to begin another, Thor's hand darted out and clamped around his brother's wrist. It wasn't enough to knock the weapon from Loki's hand, but it was enough for the movement to cease and for Loki's scowl to deepen.

Thor's left hand stayed latched around his brother's thin wrist while the other instinctively came up to block the punch weakly aimed at his right temple, the last-resort swing the automatic defense mechanism of someone who was trapped. With both Loki's hands immobilized and his sword useless in a limp grasp, Thor brought his knee up to Loki's solar plexus and knocked his breath away. Doubling over, Loki dropped like a stone, his lungs deflating with an audible "Oof!"

With Loki now sprawled on his back, Thor knelt over him, intending to pin him and finish the duel honorably by making him admit defeat. "I proclaim myself the victor," he began, dropping to one knee and reaching one hand for his brother's chest to keep him still.

But before he could touch Loki, there was a sudden flurry of movement; he couldn't tell if his brother rolled out of the way or did something else entirely, but all of a sudden, Loki evaporated from in front of him, flickering away like a ghost. Before he even had time to fathom the swift disappearance, a sharp elbow drove into his back, knocking him from one knee onto all fours, and a quick kick to his ribs rolled him onto his back. When he blinked open bleary eyes, Loki stood before him, the tip of his sword poking the soft flesh of Thor's neck.

"Would you like to rethink that?"

A murmur rippled through the crowd of shocked bystanders. Thor stared, equally surprised, at his brother standing over him. Loki glanced back at him, looking smugly pleased at the spectators' astonished reactions, and caught Thor's eye. For a moment Thor saw how triumphant he looked -viciously so, even- and he swallowed hard as the sword's blade, no longer dulled since they weren't children, dug into his neck a bit more.

But then Loki's eyes lost their fire, the tension dissolving, and a wide, genuine smile crossed his face. "Good fight, brother," he said warmly, offering a hand. "You're a worthy opponent."

Thor gaped for another moment, then, beaming, clasped his brother's hand in his as he pulled himself to his feet. "And you."

It was the only time Loki defeated Thor. _The _Duel.

()()()

"Yo. MC Hammer. You with us?"

Thor blinks, managing to draw his eyes away from the footage of Loki's cell. He sees it again-that conquering, ill-behaved smirk, as if he'd just gotten away with something huge, dancing on his brother's face even now when he is imprisoned. Stark is looking at him quizzically, as are the rest of the so-called Avengers (minus an archer known as Barton, who has apparently been enthralled by Loki and the Tesseract).

"Yes," he replies, then promptly loses himself in his thoughts again.

The rest of the Avengers see a villain, a threat to be vanquished-or killed, even, if the opportunity arises.

Thor sees his brother. A skinny, pale, witty boy who had once found gleeful entertainment in harmless pranks.

But he is starting to realize that this person, this angry, accusing demigod locked away in SHIELD's inescapable cage, who snarls and seethes and bends others to his will with words of eloquent cadence that are such beautiful lies to believe in, is _not _his brother.

()()()

In one startling moment, Thor sees his little brother again.

They are struggling on the rooftop of Stark Tower, the wind threatening to topple them both into open air, and Thor catches a glimpse of somebody he once knew. In an instant, he spots the grappling worry in Loki's eyes, watches the warring emotions play out by his expression, and scours a face that is both familiar and foreign at the same time. He feels as if he is observing Loki's soul ripping in half, a scar reopening, and he is grasping at the edges trying to hold him together.

And it is in that one second, that one impossibly small fraction of time, where he sees a boy with quiet eyes taking the blame for him, a smiling young magician balancing jasmine-smelling candles on invisible midair shelves, a helping hand extending downwards to him even in victory. He sees his _little brother. _

But his little brother is gone before Thor can speak to him and this strange, enraged person takes his place; something behind Loki's eyes closes off and Thor barely registers the knife going into his gut as Loki rolls off the roof. The knife might as well have gone into his back.

Now he has to hold _himself _together.

()()()

Once back on Asgard, Odin offers him a reward, a sumptuous sum of money for bringing the Tesseract (oh, and Loki) back safely. He waves Loki off to the dungeons upon first sight, stiffening abruptly and not shooting his adopted son a second glance.

Thor doesn't see Loki again for a few weeks. He doesn't know who _Loki _is anymore. Is Loki the smiling youth who couldn't stop laughter from bubbling up in his throat at the sight of wiggling snakes emerging from a feast pig's mouth, the tiny serpents crawling around the customary apple and causing at least one of the noblemen and ladies to faint? Or is Loki the malicious, cunning demigod whose words are riddled with poison, who almost enslaved an entire race a month before, who possessed an eternal predilection for shattering Thor's heart with his betrayals?

Thor sighs and kicks a small object across his room, sending it skittering over the polished floors. It hits the wall with a small _thump_ as Thor collapses onto his bed, miserable.

He sits up moments later, one eyebrow kinked in momentary perplexity. His eyes lock on the object he kicked, and he shoots up from the bed, grabs the object from the floor, and practically sprints down to the dungeons on a sudden impulse, a momentary spike of bravery. With his being the prince, the guards let him by immediately, and he steps into Loki's cell before he can talk himself out of it.

The first thing his eyes fall upon is, as expected, the prisoner himself. Loki slumps in the far corner, back against the wall, one knee drawn to his chest. Thor has to cough to hide the fact that he'd just gasped; his brother has lost even more weight, if that was possible, and he appears gaunt now, nearly skeletal, and much, much smaller in only his pants and tunic. Bedraggled black hair falls in his eyes, contrasting greatly to the pallor of his skin where it isn't bruised. The bruises themselves are awful for even a seasoned warrior like Thor to look at, splotching Loki's arms and chest where the loose tunic exposes his skin, and there's an especially large cut scabbing over above his right eyebrow. There's a large, clunky anklet wrapped around the leg tucked to his chest, appearing quite uncomfortable, and Thor supposes that is what is trapping Loki's magic and therefore preventing him from cleaning up his appearance.

To be frank, Loki looks horrible.

_This _is the sneering, spitting threat that had the potential to subjugate an entire planet a month prior? He cannot even fathom that idea anymore; Loki is _wasting away. _

Thor cannot bring himself to speak and for a moment just stands there and looks at him. Loki does not move, does not speak, does not even appear to breathe, and for a moment Thor experiences a flash of internal panic, half-turning to call the guards, before he recognizes the slow rise and fall of his brother's chest.

Carefully, regaining his composure, he moves forward a few steps and attempts to make as little noise as possible as he sits down a few yards from where Loki is slouched. From within his own tunic, he produces a small, cylindrical object.

_He passed his hand over the candle and it lit itself again, the small flicker of fire dancing on the stem. "You can keep that one, if you like."_

It's the candle from all those years ago.

Thor's eyes peek up for a moment to see if the object garnered any response, but Loki remains motionless, staring off at the ceiling. There's no indication as to whether or not he is even aware of Thor's presence.

Moistening his lips, the mighty Thor has to scour his soul for a moment before he can muster the strength to speak to a half-dead prisoner.

"Do you remember this?"

Loki doesn't move. Doesn't even blink. Thor wants to scream at him. He wants to poke and prod and say horrendous things, if only to get a response. He would even prefer it if Loki stood and started yelling right back.

The opposite of love is not hate. The opposite of love is _indifference, _is it not?

Thor casts his eyes downward at the candle. He can remember his own hands, much smaller than they are now, cradling the lit candle like a precious gift. With another shaking exhalation, he brings out the matches and strikes them one, two, three times before they spark. Being inferior with magic, he'd had to resort to the old-fashioned way of starting a fire with friction, and he passes the small flame onto the candle before blowing out the small flare on the matches and depositing them onto the stone floor.

The air is tinged with the scent of jasmine; of untarnished, pure youth and childish innocence: A tiny sparking reminder of what once was flickering on a candle.

"I still think of you as my brother. I always will."

The words spill from Thor's lips before he can stop them, and he realizes his error when Loki's head snaps up in his direction, an all too familiar glare settling upon his countenance.

There are bags under Loki's eyes. Has he been sleeping?

The look is still fierce. As Loki glowers, Thor stands and hastily retreats from the cell. On his way back upstairs, he grabs the pitcher of whiskey from the dining hall and takes a goblet for good measure. He passes his room completely and continues down the hallway to Loki's.

He barges in—_just like old times_—and wishes, wishes, _wishes _that he'd find a small boy sitting cross-legged on the bed, grinning at him, but there's nothing there but the countless books, coated with dust now, and the silence.

And the candles.

Thor still has more matches.

He lights all the candles, filling the room with an eerie, nostalgic glow, and Thor swears there's a skinny child dressed in green next to him, quiet eyes laughing as Thor drinks himself into the jasmine.


End file.
